All This Madness
by The Flame and Hawk's Eye
Summary: "If you can't wake up from the nightmare, maybe you're not asleep." A series of canon-verse and AU one-shots that were written in response to Goretober and Halloween prompts on Tumblr. Chapter 3: After being bitten by a chimera, Hawkeye begins to undergo some frightening changes.
1. to hell and back (1)

**A/N:** _So I took a few prompts on Tumblr for Goretober, and some general ones for Halloween and the following stories are all products of those requests. Please note that some of them may have descriptions that are not for the faint of heart, and so you should tread lightly through this fic. If any of the chapters or prompts become too graphic I will change the story's rating to 'M.' Some of them will be continued later on (for example, this chapter will have a prequel)._

 _This chapter is in response to "Royai and torture," though there wasn't much Royai in it. To make it up to the requester, I will be writing a prequel that will include Royai. (Excuse any dust this may have. I'm slowly getting back into the writing groove after a pretty brutal semester.)_

 _I hope you enjoy!_

* * *

 _We found them."_

Edward buried his face into his hands and dug his nails into his flesh as Havoc's frantic message hung squarely in the front of his mind. He swallowed the mixed bolus of sickness and anticipation that had moved into the back of his throat, and slowly staggered to his feet.

The sleepless nights and dead ends had begun to take their toll and the moment he heard those words, all rhyme or reason for his actions was gone. The receiver was returned to its cradle and he was halfway out the door before Alphonse had risen from his seat on the floor. A quick declaration of what he had just heard was uttered over his shoulder, and the clash of metal that followed immediately after confirmed that his brother had jumped to his feet just as quickly as he.

And within minutes they were nearly at the hospital's front door.

Without being given the location, Edward somehow knew. One part logical reasoning, and another part instinct. He felt that tug toward the hospital, like a moth drawn to the proverbial flame they had sparked within him the day they had met.

 _"We found them."_

Twenty-five days, eleven hours, and some odd minutes had passed since they were last seen together. Hawkeye had given the Colonel a ride home after the day, a Tuesday, had been done. It had been an ordinary, mundane day at Eastern Headquarters. The rest of the team had been catching up on paperwork after a simple mission that had occurred the week before. Edward distinctly remembers commenting on Mustang's slow progress, and Hawkeye's playful disapproval of his pointed critique.

It had been an ordinary day…

Until Wednesday morning came and neither one of them showed up for work. The first few minutes had passed without worry or concern, but when the clock struck nine they began to worry. It was unlike one of them, let alone both of them, to go without calling. And to have both of them gone on the same day was practically unheard of.

The search immediately began. First their homes, and then the routes they most frequently took. Everything they found and everything they saw was in its place, as though they had both both left their respective apartments for a day out. Even Hawkeye's car yielded no abnormalities, parked in its assigned area without a single scratch or fiber out of place.

It was as if they had just vanished into thin air.

It wasn't long after that that the rumors began to circulate. Whispers of a particular fondness of Mustang's toward his most loyal subordinate did not go unnoticed, and Edward found himself biting his tongue every time he passed small congregations of people that would collect in the halls of Eastern Command. He reminded himself at that time that anyone who wasn't involved in the case wasn't worth his time or breath, and that one more altercation with another clueless rubbernecker would result in his removal from the search team.

So the rumors continued, and he bit his tongue until it bled.

That is, until the first note came, arriving in an unassuming envelope with an unassuming letterhead, simply addressed as 'To Whom it May Concern.' And the message below was just a few, simple words:

 _We have them._

All at once the rumors vanished, and the tongues that wagged and perpetuated them joined the search and inflated its numbers. After all, they needed all of the help they could gather if they were going to be chasing ghosts.

The note left no indication of who they were, and no prints were left behind. Nor did the letter outline their intentions like a typical ransom would. Instead, it were as though it were meant to force them to speculate and wonder. And wonder they did.

The skirmish along the southern border had come to mind, and the thought of Aerugean spies targeting the country's fabled war hero had become a possibility, though it was quickly dismissed following a heated exchange that further thickened the diplomatic air between the two countries. Then their sights shifted toward smaller organizations, but the failure to demand a ransom left investigators scrambling to determine what their intentions were.

No matter the intentions that were speculated, Edward kept his mind focused on what was most important: finding them.

Before more theories could be speculated, however, they discovered that the intentions of the ones who were responsible were far more sinister than they could have ever imagined.

The second and final letter was delivered to Eastern Command adorned with splotches of black ink and red. The envelope was stiff and thick, completely opposite of the light and professional air the first had.

Hughes had been eager to lap up any information the letter provided after being left forlorn and without purpose following the first he had received. But not even he could have imagined what was inside that envelope before he opened it.

Edward distinctly remembered how Hughes' cry pierced his ears and immediately settled in his bones. It's something he will never forget. He had turned, bewildered and desperate for answers, to find a severed finger roll to a stop atop the Lieutenant Colonel's desk. The initial shock, however, was far more benign than the speculation, then horror, that followed when it was finally identified using the Colonel's registration that was on file from when he first joined the military.

The sky above them let go and Ed lifted his arm to shield his eyes as he sprinted up the hospital's front steps. They told themselves when they made that grisly discovery was that that was all that had happened. That the Colonel and Hawkeye were in one piece… for the most part.

He continued to tell himself that as they sprinted past the front desk and toward the heart of the hospital. Edward had been there often enough to know where they would be. A few turns and a few ducks around hospital personnel pulled him closer and closer until the stark contrast of the navy uniforms to the periwinkle scrubs caught his attention, and he skidded to a stop and paused to catch his breath.

"Brother," Alphonse whispered after catching up, carefully eyeing the two guards that had stationed themselves outside of the treatment area. "Maybe we aren't aloud to go in there yet-"

Edward brushed off his brother's hesitance and squared his shoulders. They were just as much, if not more, a part of the investigation than most. Hell, Mustang was his superior officer. He had just as much a right as the rest of the men, if not more.

He threw up a sloppy salute and went to maneuver around them when the soldier nearest him intervened and blocked his path. He stopped short of slamming into him and staggered a few steps back, eyes narrowed as the soldier resumed his position and shook his head. "Sorry kid, but we can't let you in there."

Edward gritted his teeth and dug his hand into his pocket, producing his pocket watch a few seconds later. "I'm a State Alchemist. I have just as much a right as the rest of my unit to be in there, so let me by." He pushed past the soldier and placed his hand on the door handle, and felt a grip on his shoulder. A sharp shrug brushed it off and he turned the handle. The hand quickly returned and grabbed his arm, pulling him away from the door. "Let me _go_ ," he snapped, and the soldiers tensed.

"Brother, please," Al pleaded. "Let's wait until Lieutenant Havoc comes for us. There has to be a reason why—"

Edward jerked his elbow back and into the soldier's diaphragm. The soldier gasped and released his grip on him, doubling over as the air evacuated itself from his lungs. The second stationed grabbed at him and he danced beneath his arms and back over to the door, pushing his shoulder into it as he turned the handle. Another pleading gasp from Al fell unanswered and he threw the door open and stumbled into the room.

"Ed?"

He briefly made eye contact with a rather offput Havoc before he tore his eyes away, scanning over the startled expressions of the doctors before they fell on the two people he most wanted to see. Edward stepped toward them, a concerned greeting on his lips, when he got closer and lost everything he had wanted to say as it plunged down his throat and into his stomach.

"I'm sorry," Al apologized softly as he slowed to a stop behind him. "But we just wanted to—oh." Out of the corner of his eye Ed could see Alphonse stiffen and knew that if he could see him clearly, the sparks of light in his eyes would have almost certainly dimmed.

A hand gripped his arm, and this time he allowed himself to be pulled away. His eyes found Havoc's again, saw that the anger they had held had ebbed away. The lump in Edward's throat caught and he opened his mouth to speak, but again found that every thought and feeling he had disappeared. Another pull on his arm sent him stumbling back and he clumsily reached out and fell into Al's chest.

"'m sorry," he murmured as he tried to look somewhere, anywhere, but them, and turned his eyes toward the ceiling and his brother's face. Alphonse hadn't flinched despite the crash of Edward's metal arm against his chest plate, his soul-fire eyes still vehemently glued to the pair they had found seated on the shared edge of a hospital bed. Edward braced his hand against his brother's chest, and a moment later Alphonse's armor began to quiver. He could feel the grip on his arm tighten, silently demanding that he continue to follow, and Ed swallowed the lump that had tightened in his throat and rasped, "Al… we have to go."

There was a lag from the time the words had left Edward's mouth to the moment they reached and processed in Al's mind. But once they had Al looked down at him, the fires behind his mask kindled by the panic and questions that had begun to settle in his soul.

Ed tapped his fingers against his armor one final time before his metal hand slid off and returned limply to his side. "We have to go now, Al. We'll come back later," he murmured as he took a few steps past his brother. He heard the familiar clank of him turning but when he failed to hear his footfall, Edward looked over his shoulder to see Al's eyes flitting between Havoc and him.

An invisible force drove itself into his stomach when his gaze followed Al's to Havoc and he quickly tore his eyes away. "We're sorry," he muttered. "We're… I'm sorry."

He willed himself to walk toward the door, despite his feet feeling as though they had been tied to blocks of lead. The moment he reached the threshold, however, the invisible bindings on his feet loosened. Driven by the churning sickness that had settled in his stomach, he pulled his arm from the soldier's grip and took off down the hallway. A few beats later he heard the crash of Al's steel boots against the hospital floor as he followed. He heard Al call for him to stop as he grabbed a corner and pulled himself around it.

Unaware that the floor had recently been cleaned, Edward's feet slipped and slid out from beneath him and he crashed to his hands and knees. He doubled over and retched and pressed his forehead to the floor, gritting his teeth and closing his eyes as the images he had been running from finally caught up with him and crashed into his mind.

A moment later Al crashed to his knees beside him and touched his hand to his back. "B-brother," he whimpered. "Are… are you okay?"

He curled his hands into fists and shook his head and bit his tongue. He knew by Al's tone that he was far from okay too, and it killed him knowing that _he_ was the one to drag him there and yet, _he_ was the one who needed to be comforted after what they had seen. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm sorry, Al."

"'Sorry,'" Al echoed. "Brother, you don't have to be sorry. We… we didn't know. We didn't know..."

"But we would have known eventually, right?" His voice sounded frail against his ears, and he realized that the poorly constructed wall he had tried to hide behind had begun to crumble. "We would have… eventually."

When they did eventually find out, would it have softened the blow to have been in a controlled setting? One where Havoc had to hold their hands and guide them to what happened to Mustang and Hawkeye. He liked to think that would be the case, though he knew deep down that the horror could never truly be mitigated. Instead, he realized that their premature discovery forced the questions he would have asked later after living in ignorance into his mind. Now he found himself wanting to demand answers, to know what they had done to deserve what had happened.

Ed pushed himself up onto his knees and sat back on his heels. He rested his hands on his lap palms up and stared down at them. "I don't think it would have mattered when, though, huh?" He paused, expecting his brother to answer. But when he didn't like he had expected, he lifted his eyes to find that Alphonse was sitting down beside him, his head quietly bowed. The gentle thrum of metal gritting across metal met Edward's ears, and he reached out and placed a hand against his brother's quivering arm.

He lifted trembling hands and pressed his fingertips below his eyes. "W… why, Brother?" he sobbed as he curled his fingers into fists against his cheeks. His brother's outcry wound knots in his stomach and he swallowed the bolus of dread that had lodged itself in his throat. "His hands," Alphonse gasped, curling his fists tighter and shook his head. "And… and _her eyes_. Can't we… Why can't we just…?" He bowed forward and crushed his chest against his knees, and Ed's hand moved insensately to Alphonse's back.

There it was. The question that had ploughed through his mind the moment he saw them, unbandaged and damaged beyond repair. The tepid plea behind his frantic bawl not too unlike the bargain he himself had wagered to God Himself when their mother had died. An appeal that, despite his vast wealth of knowledge, he knew held no sound bearings in their branch of alchemy. It was one thing to heal a wound, but it was an entirely different level when it came to reconstructing hands and eyes that had been completely lost. He, just like those around them, were completely powerless. He would still continue to wrack his brain, though, until every possible avenue was exhausted, and until his body could no longer bear the strain.

But until then, his vulnerability bled through, and he only managed to muster a weak, "I… I don't know, Al."


	2. god save the queen (0)

_**A/N:** Hey guys! I'm back with another one-shot for this little collection. Thank you to everyone who read the first installment. _

**_Please note that the prequel/what happens that will follow the first chapter of this story will come at the end of this fic because it will change its 'T' rating to an 'M!'_** _I would like to avoid it until I can :)_

 _This chapter is inspired by this piece of art by b-griveros on Tumblr (remove the '*'):_ _http:****/b-griveros.****tumblr.****com/post/****166309802528/aksnksnaksn-sorry-to-just-randomly-pop-into-****your_

 _It's inspired me so much that I'm really considering turning this into a full-length fic. For now, this chapter is a brief summation of the general sense of what the first three chapters will be about. I know there are more questions than answers with it, but I'd like to eventually elaborate in a full-length fic. So consider this a 'taster' chapter of a fic with this summary:_

 **Synopsis** : _Five years after the Promised Day, Mustang and his team discover that there are still devout factions of Father's followers who want nothing more than to continue building on his dying legacy. When the team corners them, they believe that they have stopped whatever his followers were going to put into motion until Hawkeye begins to exhibit signs reminiscent of an ancient Xerxian sickness known as "Gate Madness."_

 _ **Primary Timeline** : Amestris, 1919 (italics, Resembool 1909)._

* * *

 _It's dark…_

* * *

 _"'Gate madness?' C'mon, Al. We have more important things to read about."_

 _Alphonse stuck out his lower lip and shoved the book Edward had batted away back into his face. "This_ is _important, Brother. What if it happens to us when we try to bring Mom back?"_

 _Ed rolled his eyes and snatched the book away from his younger brother and set it down his lap. Then he grabbed the book he had been reading and laid it atop the first, and began to thumb through it again to find the spot he had left off. Before he could resume reading, it was ripped from his field of vision and slammed closed. Edward looked into his brother's eyes and matched his disgruntled glare. "What the hell was that for, Al? I told you we have more important things to read."_

 _"And this is one of them," Al protested again as he pressed his finger to the text passage again. "We need to know all the risks of performing alchemy like this, Brother."_

 _Edward groaned. "For the last time, Al, there_ aren't _any risks. We've accessed our Gates every time we've done a transmutation. If we were supposed to crazy because of it, we would have a long time ago. Besides, I haven't read about it anywhere else except for in translated Xerxian literature. If it was still happening we would have heard about it. Hell, you know Teacher would have told us about it if there was any danger with performing alchemy."_

 _"Yeah, but the books haven't specified what kind of transmutation. And Teacher never performed the kind of alchemy we're going to." His face slackened and his eyes grew wide when Edward's lips pulled into a thin line. "Brother," he pleaded softly. "Please? Can't we just look at it quickly? Just to be sure."_

 _He groaned. "Fine. We'll look over it." Al's eyes lit up and he lifted a finger to reiterate. "Once. We'll look over it once and then get back to reading things that matter, okay?"_

 _"Okay," Al nodded vigorously and settled down next to his brother._

 _Edward let out a deep sigh and looked down at the wall of text his brother had pointed out again and began to skim it over. When he had read a few lines, he repeated back to him what he had gathered from it. "So it's basically something that comes on immediately after a transmutation takes place, right?"_

 _"Yeah," Al confirmed._

 _"And the alchemist that it would befall just..." He held the book closer to his face and scrunched his brows together. "Babbled? So they just started spewing out nonsense the second the transmutation was complete?"_

 _"It wasn't just 'nonsense,'" Al explained, pointing to the next paragraph down. "Apparently it wasn't any language they had ever heard before. The book says that it was structured like language would be, but it was never identified. That's why they called it 'the sign of Babel.'"_

* * *

 _It's dark…_

* * *

"Wait," Mustang snapped and grabbed Dr. Knox's wrist. When the disgruntled doctor turned around and glared, he said, "How do you know you haven't already given enough?"

Knox ripped his arm from the General's grip and lifted the needle and syringe between his fingers for him to see. "This drug is titrated to effect, General. Does it look like it's had _any_ effect on her?"

Edward grimaced and turned away when Mustang's face darkened. He could taste the tension that had been steadily emulsifying between them on his tongue, and he knew that it wouldn't be long until the General snapped. Knowing that he was between a rock and a hard place at that moment, he turned his attention toward his brother and Hawkeye, but immediately regretted it.

Alphonse pressed a hand against her shoulder and murmured something to her as she raised a hand to her face and continued to chatter under her breath. His attempt to reach her did little, if anything, to change her course of action, and she pressed her fingers harder against her cheeks and stared blankly ahead.

Forty-two hours. That was how long she had remained awake whispering nonsensical strings of gibberish without pause. Every single attempt to get her to stop, from waving hands in her face to addressing her to pushing drugs potent enough to knock a man three times her size over proved fruitless, failing to bring her back to a cognizant state of mind.

A mental breakdown, the other doctors had initially decided as they watched her babble and claw her fingers through her hair. From the stress that had been building since she had been promoted months earlier. The weight it had beared on her proved too much when the case grew too burdensome for Mustang's unit to handle, they said. Suddenly it became the fault of her superior officer and, no matter how they tried to dissuade them from making accusations when they hadn't seen her -hadn't seen her drop to her knees and scream the moment that transmutation was activated- nothing would make them consider anything otherwise.

That is, until she wouldn't stop.

* * *

 _"The book says that it could sometimes last a few hours, or even a few days. Just going nonstop."_

 _Edward pressed his lips together and frowned. For days? "That... doesn't seem like it would be mentally or physically feasible, Al. They would have to stop at some point to eat or rest."_

 _"They do stop, Brother," Alphonse said, and pointed to the next paragraph down. "Eventually…"_

* * *

The moment Edward stepped into the hospital, he knew that something was different. He felt… lighter, and it seemed that the same effect had befallen the staff members he walked past, their shoulders squared and their eyes fixed forward. A few even had satisfied smiles on their faces, as though they had been patted on the back and given the satisfaction of a job well done.

Edward quickened his pace. Something must have happened while he was away. Something positive, he reckoned, judging by how at ease the staff seemed to be.

He rounded the corner and paused, straining to listen to confirm whether his initial gut feeling was correct or not. When a few moments passed and he didn't hear what he had expected to, an odd mix of relief and confusion washed over him. For once in that seventy-two hour period, it was eerily quiet. He made the rest of his way to Hawkeye's room and braced his hand against the doorjamb and peered into the room.

His eyes skirted across and then quickly returned to the familiar person slouched forward in his chair. Edward stepped lightly toward him, his gaze briefly flitting over to the sleeping Captain. _Something_ had clearly worked to calm her down, it seemed. Whatever it was, he was thankful. Not just for her, but for the General as well. He stopped beside Mustang and gave his shoulder a gentle push. He latter snorted softly and moved his head a fraction of an inch before settling back into his slumber. Edward tried again, this time applying more pressure. The General groaned and reached up to rub at his eyes, shifting in his seat to straighten himself. He mumbled unintelligibly under his breath before lifting his gaze to find who had woken him up.

Edward's face softened as he silently took note of the General's physicality. The circles that had become chronic fixtures during the case had darkened considerably, and the lines that had accented them had deepened. Ed knew that the case had been slowly eating away at Mustang since they had first taken it weeks ago, but what happened to Hawkeye accelerated its progression. He had just seen him the afternoon prior, but even then he didn't look like a corpse. "I thought they told you to go home," he mumbled, digging his hands into the pockets of his jacket.

Mustang blinked once, twice, and then slowly turned his attention back to Hawkeye. He folded his arms across his chest and settled down in the chair, crossing his ankle over his knee. "I used the showers here and ate at the cafeteria downstairs." Though his answer was terse, it was lacking its defensive bite.

Edward exhaled slowly and shook his head. "You need to rest, Mustang. You're going to wear yourself out if you keep this up."

The General nodded slowly to prove he was listening, though the action was hollow and without meaning. Edward knew that it was pointless to argue with him. He had acted the same way when he found out Hawkeye had to be hospitalized longer than he after the Promised Day. The only way they had gotten him out of there was practically dragging him, but even then he found a way back to her. He had a feeling that the result would be similar unless he convinced him to leave of his own free will, which he doubted he would be able to do by himself. The only one who would be able to persuade him by herself was in no condition to.

"Did you decipher what that circle was for?"

Realizing that his eyes had drifted over to Hawkeye, Edward snapped his gaze over to Mustang to find him watching him out of the corner of his eye. He swallowed, unnerved by how quickly his stare had shifted character, and slowly shook his head. "I've figured out what most of the characters were, but there are still a few Xerxian runes I haven't seen before now."

Mustang made a noise in his throat and turned back to Hawkeye. His expression immediately softened when his gaze fell on her and, for a moment, he looked like he had regressed the ten years that had piled on. After a few seconds, he closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "The ones responsible haven't uttered a single word about what it was they were doing or what their intended goal was with that transmutation. So all…" he took a shaking breath and sunk lower into his chair. "So all I have is that container we found in the middle of the circle and whatever that lunatic said to you." He pulled his hand away from his face and shifted his gaze toward Edward.

Edward knew without Mustang having to reiterate. Mustang wanted to probe him again; ask if he had remembered another fine detail despite having wracked his brain numerous times searching for something that could lead them _somewhere_. He looked down and idly scuffed the toe of his shoe over a mark on the floor. The problem was the more he examined what their exchange, the more he began to doubt himself.

All they knew was that the people responsible had connections to the former Fuhrer, King Bradley, and by association the Homunculus that had known as 'Father.' They had slinked into the shadows well before the military's corruption came to light, and their existence had been forgotten until they began to make waves large enough for the military to sense. As bits of information began to trickle forth, it became apparent that something sinister was underway. But they didn't know -even now they didn't know- what was happening, even when they had disrupted them partway through activating a transmutation circle ancient enough that he and Al couldn't decipher it.

All they did know about it was that something had happened. Something that had driven her to madness.

"It's alright if you don't remember," Mustang droned despairingly as he settled back into the chair and leaned his temple against his fist. "I just figured I'd see if there was anything else I could grapple with."

"No. I'm sorry," Edward muttered, lifting his eyes enough to see the edge of the bed. "If I remember anything, I'll let you know."

Mustang gave him a languid nod and shut his eyes. "Alright…"

Edward shifted his weight and looked up at Hawkeye again. She hadn't stirred during their conversation, her only movement being the steady rise and fall of her chest while she slept. In some ways, it was more disconcerting seeing her this way. At least when she was awake, they knew that her mind was still churning, still functioning in some way. But when she was sleeping like that, her breathing deep and relaxed and every bit of her at peace, was a stark contrast to how she had been the last time he saw her.

"She's been sleeping since this morning," Mustang muttered, breaking Edward out of his trance. He raised his eyes and caught the worn General's, and Mustang gestured toward her as his expression shifted toward despondency. "It happened so quickly. Like a switch had been thrown. Where one moment she was awake, and the next she wasn't. There was just this... sudden silence."

"Really," Edward murmured stealing a glance toward her again. "Just like that she…" Wait… He whipped his head around, startling Mustang from his languid state. "What did you say?"

Mustang's brows knitted together. "What are you-"

"What you said," Edward interrupted, gesturing to Hawkeye. "You said that there was just 'something.' What was it?"

His confusion deepening, the General muttered, "I said that it had suddenly gotten silent-"

* * *

 _"'Swift silence'?" Edward lowered the book and lifted a bemused brow. "So they just… suddenly stopped?"_

 _"That's what it sounds like," Alphonse said as he pressed his finger against the passage. "Apparently they fall asleep."_

 _Edward wrinkled his nose. "Yeah, probably because they're so exhausted after staying up for days babbling." He closed the book shut and tossed it aside, much to Alphonse's dismay, and reached for the book he had been reading. He flipped it open to the page he had been on before and began to skim down the page to find where he had left off._

 _"Brother, please-"_

 _"I've read enough, Al," he said, shoving the book away a second time. "We need to get back to studying. We can read it later."_

 _Alphonse drew in a sharp breath, preparing himself to argue again. Ed braced himself, ready to counter with a reminder that they had_ committed _to it, but his proclamation would never be. Rather than continue to fight what he decided would be an uphill battle, Al deflated and pulled the book back into his lap. "Fine… We'll read the rest later."_

* * *

 _Fullmetal?_

Where had he heard that before? This abrupt silence subsequent to nonsensical chatter. He had heard it before, read about it before. Where-

" _Edward_."

He blinked and suddenly Mustang was standing in front of him. The General carefully prodded his shoulder as the last remaining piece of himself returned from the place he had briefly gone. "Fullmetal," he said again, "What happened? You're as pale as a ghost."

"I…" he stammered, "I..."

Mustang's eyes widened and the color drained from his cheeks as quickly as it did Edward's. "What's wrong?" He grabbed hold of Edward's other shoulder. "Fullmetal, _what happened_?"

"I… Just remembered something I read a long time ago that just… It just sounds too similar to what happened to her." He remembered now. That book he and Alphonse had read when they were children that detailed what he had determined was a fabricated disease designed to scare alchemists from transmuting. But the signs… everything that was happening was happening to a 't.' He couldn't remember what happened next.

He need that book. He needed to-

A hand grabbed hold of his shoulder and he whirled around, not realizing that he had broken away from Mustang's grip and had made it halfway across the hospital room. Mustang's eyes were wider now, and the spark of confusion that had ignited in his eye had vanished, leaving behind a blink of terror when he failed to understand Edward's actions. "Fullmetal," he uttered. "What do you mean?"

He dipped out of Mustang's hold. "I can't explain it right now. I don't know if it's true yet I just… need to find it."

"Find what?" Mustang reached for him again and he ducked away. "Fullmetal, what are you talking about?"

"Trust me, Mustang. Just… stay with her. Please." He never finished it he never finished it he didn't know how it ended.

"Fullmetal, please-"

Before Mustang could finish, he was halfway down the hallway, dodging and ducking past staff and visitors and as he raced toward the door. He needed to find it.

The book he never paid further attention to. He needed the answers. First there was chattering and then there was silence.

What else?

What else happened?

 _What happened to those alchemists after that_?

* * *

 _Where is it? Where is it?!_

When pushing away the books that had been piled on top of his desk yielded nothing, Edward lashed out and knocked the remainder of them that hadn't crashed to the floor and climb up onto it. He began feverishly ripping and pulling out every book that came into view that wasn't what he was looking for, tossing them over his shoulder without a second thought.

It's there. He _knows_ it's there, buried deep in the archives he had cast it into when he had believed it was meaningless drivel logged to strike fear into the minds of reluctant alchemists. But now he understood that it was not a parody like he had thought.

It was a warning.

He needed to find it. _He needed it_ -

"Brother!"

He grunted an apology to his brother and muttered something to motivate him to keep looking. Edward reached out, grabbing another book in his hand, and wound his arm back to toss it away, but was stopped when Alphonse grabbed his arm. He whirled around, a demand to know why he was impeding them on his tongue, but froze, becoming still as stone. Edward's gaze dropped with Alphonse as he released his arm and slowly lowered himself to the ground in front of a scroll he had discarded moments before.

"Brother," Alphonse said in a low voice, as calm and collected as the situation would allow, "I want you to listen to me because I think I found something."

Edward's eyes drifted from his brother's gaze down to the scroll itself. His brows wrinkled when he recognized it, but he knew it better to give Alphonse the stage for a few moments' time. He reached his arm behind him and discarded the book in his hand onto the desk, and slowly lowered himself to his knees across from his brother. Alphonse's hands came into view and smoothed it out, taking care to avoid smudging the delicate, faded writing that was crudely scribbled across it. Edward swallowed hard, forcing down the bolus of anxiety that had begun to accumulate in his mouth, and he cleared his throat. "Alright, Al," he grounded out, "I'm listening." He felt his brother's gaze fall on him for a few moments again and he drew his lips together tightly in an effort to conceal what he was feeling.

"I know what you're going to say," Alphonse said as he tore his gaze away from Edward to look down at the scroll's contents. He nervously smoothed it out again. "You're going to scold me for paying attention to what we thought was a children's story, but I'm going to tell you you're wrong."

Edward lifted his eyes and met Al's gaze. The uncertainty in his brother's expression had completely vanished, leaving behind an unwavering determination reminiscent of the resolution he had shown the night they had first performed human transmutation. His face softened and he dipped his head. "You've got my attention, Al," he murmured. "What is it you found?"

Without missing a beat, Alphonse dragged his finger in a line beneath the name that had been haphazardly scrawled across the top. "Even though it's a little rough-looking, I noticed that our dad's name was written at the top of this." Edward leaned closer and peered at the crudely written signature. "It's a little difficult to read. I think Dad wrote it when he was first learning to write, but I know it's his signature."

"Al…" he sighed. "Why are you-"

"Brother," Alphonse interrupted. "Please."

"Right. Sorry…"

Alphonse breathed out and slowly moved his finger down the paper to one of the paragraphs. "Before I was going to roll it up, I glanced at it to see if there would be any value in it and… Well." He tapped his finger below one of the sentences. "This caught my attention, Brother. It says, 'they who knocked on Hell's Gate raised their voices and we answered. And in their arrogant silence _they_ invited _us in_ , and became us.''"

Edward's brows knitted together. "Al, I don't… I don't understand."

"It's talking about someone knocking on the Gate. Their voices were raised and then they fell silent before they invited whatever was on the other side to their side. And in turn, the ones who knocked _became_ what was on the other side of the Gate. But," he swallowed and moved a trembling finger to the last line of the passage, "It isn't written from Dad's point of view, Brother. It was written from the viewpoint of whatever was on the other side."

On the other side… of the Gate? He replayed what his brother read to him in his mind to validate what he had said. Those who knocked had voices raised, and then they fell silent, and invited whatever was on the other side into them… "But what-" A tremble shot through his spine, and his mind quickly followed what his instinct had detected first.

There was only one other person, or rather 'being,' that had told Hohenheim what to write when he was just beginning to learn. To perform and understand alchemy enough to knock on the Gate's door… because it had once answered itself.

"... Brother?"

He turned to Alphonse and saw the realization he had come to reflected in his brother's eyes. "I understand now, Al," he uttered. His hands balled into fists and he dug his nails into his palms as he slowly lowered his arms to his sides. He knew they needed to move -to run- but the overwhelming realization was crippling.

He understood. He understood what happened when the transmutation circle was activated, what had been invited in from the Gate that drove men and women to madness, and molded innocent alchemists into versions of themselves. Because he had seen firsthand what they were able to do, and the control they could take when a body is offered to them.

He knew, just as Alphonse did, and as the rest of them understood, what a Homunculus was capable of.

* * *

 _My eyes… Where is it?… Where is the light…?_

* * *

The scent of blood was overwhelming, _exhilarating_. Never had she surmised that _this_ would be the result of a transmutation of that magnitude, especially when her memories painted a much less graphic retelling.

She stepped carefully over the remains of the failed Philosopher's Stone, taking care to avoid the growing pool of blood that had begun to spread around the body that once housed its soul. It had been a frustrating realization, discovering that the knowledge she had possessed before had grown stagnant in the time that she had grappled with the memories of the woman whose body she had taken. Blinded by her naïvety, she had thoughtlessly followed the visions that had plagued her until she lost herself in the months and years that had been that woman's -Riza's- life and, in the process, had corroded her existing understanding of the fundamentals that had shaped her existence beyond the Gate. The days she had spent clawing her way through Riza Hawkeye's mind and settling down into it had stripped her of the tools she needed to accrue that world's knowledge.

It was necessary to use him to return whence she came to peer into the Gate and collect the understanding she needed to create the Philosopher's Stone. As memory served, he had survived his journey through the Gate once before, and had remained fairly intact. Whether it was by her design or the Gate's, or an unintended rebound that had ripped Roy's eyes from his skull, she was not sure. All she knew was that his return had been much more torturous than his journey prior.

She stopped in front of him and lifted his chin to inspect the damage that had been done, peering into the empty holes where his eyes once sat. His lids slammed shut and he gasped and sputtered as the adrenaline his body had pumped through his veins slowly began to recede and the pain began to take control. She felt as though she should have felt something -anything- for what had happened to him as memories of what he had looked like before the transmutation played systematically through her mind. Remorse? Sorrow? A tug at her heartstrings? A heavy soul-

His hand shot up and clasped her arm, and the emptiness pooled with a newfound sentiment as his lips curled back threateningly.

"Fascinating," she breathed, entranced, as she reached toward his face with her other hand. "Your eyes are-"

His grip on her arm constricted, and he sputtered, "I was _with her_ … every moment. How… how did you do it? What did you do with her you… _you monster_!"

Oh… Despite what he had seen, despite having his eyes torn from his skull by God itself moments before, his mind had still wandered to the woman. Denial, perhaps? An impish smile found its way to her face and she traced a finger around his lips. "Mmm… Such big words from an incapacitated bargaining chip. It's unfortunate that the Gate didn't take your tongue instead. It would have certainly made you more amenable."

He dug his nails into her skin, burying them deep enough to make her bleed. She watched as the droplets of blood he drew beaded and rolled down her arm. An odd mix of familiarity and newness brewed inside of her, and the pain it drew piqued her curiosity. Her body was responding to the pain as it should, she supposed, but for her it was a new experience. As the flares and spikes of discomfort grew, however, her wonderment quickly escalated to annoyance, and then to frustration. Her hand fell from the side of his face and wrapped around his throat. He responded by abandoning her arm to encircle her wrist. She tightened her hold and he, in turn, tightened his. "Where is she?" he spat. "What…" he dug deeper into her arm, "Did you do," deeper and deeper until he reached bone, " _With her_?"

The pain was mounting, and the growing vexation she had held at bay began to boil over. Her hand constricted and cut his supply of air. His mouth dropped open and he began to gasp. "You failed to listen to me before, continuing to deny the truth I spoke. The moment I stepped foot into this world from beyond the Gate was the moment her body became mine as well."

Her hold tightened and he was no longer able to suckle the air surrounding him. "This container, its memories, and the scars it bears are now mine _and_ hers. The body you are digging yourself into and defiling is the same body you have laid down with and loved."

Something in his expression changed, and his grip began to loosen. The thread that bound his sanity to his mind began to unravel, and she could feel his soul's frantic energy as it writhed and pulled and tugged despite itself, trying to process. Trying to understand. He gasped and clawed at her hands, at his throat, and she released her grip on him and let him fall. He wrapped his hands tightly around his neck, hacking and gagging, claiming back the air she had stolen from him.

She crouched down next to him and tilted his chin toward her. "I _am_ Riza Hawkeye, and the woman that you knew and that you loved, is dead."


	3. once bitten

A/N: I've been slacking on posting these! Here is my response to the Tumblr prompt: 'Royai and werewolves.' I hope you enjoy! And Happy Halloween! (I'll finish uploading the rest in the coming days - including the second part of the first chapter). Thank you for the reviews, favorites, and follows thus far!

* * *

There had once been a phrase Riza had assigned to the rare time when the light of day would combat and eventually fall to make way for the darkness of night, where clouds threatening rain would dominate in a sunless, dreary sky. It held true especially now that the summer had faded and made way to fall, leaving behind the sun's warmth in favor of chilled breezes and dry, fallen leaves. During her youth, when days such as this one presented themselves, she would refer to that gloomy hour between night and day as the "witching hour."

Though she had never believed in the notion when she was younger, there was something about referring to the spine-tingling phenomenon as such that was strangely exhilarating. It almost forth a tiny, forgotten piece of her youth that did, somewhere, believe in the supernatural circumstances that such a title would imply. Whether it was the day's unusual circumstances that caused her to pause and remember it, or the increasingly darkening sky that contrasted beautifully against the orange and red leaves of the trees that lined East City's streets, she wasn't entirely sure…

"How are you feeling?"

Startled from her musing, Riza looked up and toward Roy to find him peering at her from the corner of his eye. He lifted a brow and his eyes momentarily flickered down to the bandage wrapped around her forearm. She followed his gaze down and she realized that she had been picking at the wrapping. She pulled her hand away and shook her head. "It's alright, sir. A bit irritated, but nothing the antibiotics can't fix."

"I mean _you_. How are _you_ feeling?"

Riza couldn't say that she was surprised by the stiffness in both his posture and tone. After all, though they had finished a major part of the investigation, it was still far from over. Her face softened to convey some form of appeasement when his eyes returned to her. "I'm okay. Really. How are you feeling, sir?"

He breathed in through his nose and released a hand from the steering wheel to push it through his hair. "To be honest," he muttered, "Not all that well. I don't know what that thing was, Riza, I've been wracking my brain ever since to try and figure it out. And the fact that I let my guard down and allowed it to bite you just… It just kills me."

The utterance of her first name dropped the wall of formality they had automatically defaulted to. She reached over and brushed her fingers over the hand nearest her to momentarily draw his attention to her again. "You didn't allow it to happen, Roy. The moment I saw it, I reacted."

"Yeah… By putting yourself directly in its path."

Riza shook her head. "I think you're forgetting my job description, _sir_."

His lip twitched and he returned her correction with an equal sentiment. "And I think you're forgetting that it had five toes, _Lieutenant_." The reassurance in her tone appeared to have lost its momentum when he retorted that statement back to her. She pressed her lips together and willed her fingers to stop fumbling with the bandage as the air between them grew frigid. "It wasn't something natural," he continued as his grip on the wheel tightened. "And I have no doubt in my mind that it was something created."

"A chimera."

He pressed his lips together and nodded. They both knew that the existence of something so… functional was outside the realm of something even the military had created. A quick review of their records had confirmed that Shou Tucker had been the most advanced alchemist the military had when it came to chimerical alchemy. To think that something like _that_ existed without the military's knowledge or advanced funding was another concern entirely. "The fact that it looked like that is confirmation enough for me. But the only thing that is unclear is what it was mixed with…" He trailed off and was lost in thought again, returning to a mental picture of the creature they had encountered. Everything about it at first glance was canine, from its muzzle to its pricked ears, and to its quadrupedal body. The only characteristic that had been out of place was its abnormally long digits. It went without saying what it was he was thinking, though, and she struggled to think that the possibility, however unlikely, was even something being considered. Dabbling in alchemy that involved human experimentation was strictly forbidden. Even she, as someone who was not involved in alchemy, knew the repercussions of such a thing. And while it wasn't outside the realm of possibility that alchemists could stumble outside the laws of alchemy, as they had seen happen before, she found it difficult to remember anything about it that screamed 'human.' The way it had moved, the way it struck, was purely animalistic. "But maybe," he added with a nervous laugh, combing his fingers through his hair, "It was mixed with an ape or something."

It was all they could hope for with what they knew. She wouldn't try to contest his thoughts or argue what his mind had begun to churn toward. Instead all she could do was try to ease his concern, to be his ground.

"Maybe I'm just overreacting," he added thoughtfully. "After all, seeing unfamiliar alchemy at work can make a novice of anyone who doesn't know."

She knew that he knew she had faced far worse injuries in the line of duty. Maybe it was the alchemist in him and the ordinary person in her who saw things differently. After all, she didn't have the knowledge he possessed when it came to alchemy. Her lack of understanding of it then left little room for speculation beyond concern for a possible infection resulting from the wound. She brushed her fingers over the bandage again as the simple thought of infection sprang into her mind, and she took note that it was beginning to tingle some. She'd have to remember to apply the antibiotic cream once she got home.

Despite everything, though, Riza would never regret her split second decision to cover him with her body while she aligned her lethal shot. The wound would eventually heal and leave behind a light scar, just like the rest. The point would become moot for the time being, she decided, as she switched her mind over to trying to ease his worry. "We won't know for certain until the pathologists come to their conclusion, Roy. Right now I have to believe that the doctor did everything he was supposed to to ensure that it heals correctly." He bit his lip, and she knew that she had struck the correct cord. Roy knew just as well as she that all they could do was wait. The slain beast would be dissected and studied by Central's laboratory and the answers they sought would be available soon. "Plus it's Friday. I'll have the entire weekend to monitor myself."

"And you know that I'll be available anytime as well." The car came to a slow stop and Riza glanced out her window and saw that they had arrived at her place. "I mean it, Riza. If anything happens, I'm just a phone call away."

She turned toward him again and saw that for the first time since the conversation had come up, he appeared to be more at ease. A small smile found its way to her lips as she ran her hand gingerly over the bandage on her arm. "I'll be fine, Roy."

The contagion of her smile caught him and he gave her one in return. "Is it alright if I check in? Maybe call before bed tonight? I don't want my bodyguard to think that she's being forgotten by her boss just because it's the weekend."

"I don't see a problem with that," she said as she unlatched the car door and began to climb out of the car. "I'll be sure to keep the radio turned low tonight."

"Is there anything you need? I'm heading to the west-side market tomorrow and could pick you up."

Her smile widened and she looked over her shoulder to see him leaning over her chair, brows quirked questioningly. The market in question was out of the way of his apartment, and at least an extra fifteen minutes from the market that was closest to him. He claimed that it didn't have the freshest produce it could have, and that the one closest to her did. Of course, any other time he didn't want to stop by, he was content going to the one near him. Riza shook her head. It went without saying what his true intentions were. "I'll have to do an inventory of what I have, but I'll let you know when I talk to you later."

A small spark ignited in his eyes and extinguished the last remaining bit of worry he had been holding onto. "That sounds good," he said. "Just keep me posted."

She nodded. "I will," she said. "Good night, sir."

The return to formality signaled to him the end of the conversation but, with his worry temporarily laid to rest, he lifted a hand in salutation and repeated the same level of professionalism toward her. She closed the door and gave him a small wave before turning on her heels and heading up the steps of the small townhome she lived. It wasn't until she reached the top and was at her door, though, that he finally left.

* * *

Roy's words hung in Riza's mind from the second he uttered them to the moment she inserted the key into the lock on her door, and she wondered if maybe she _was_ being too nonchalant about what had occurred. She had been bitten by something before, a dog when she was younger. It was a stray that the people in her hometown had fed, herself included. One day it had chosen to direct its unannounced aggression toward her, and had latched onto her arm. She still had the scars from the bite she received that day, a small row of tiny pricks that formed a perfect crescent on the underside of her left forearm.

Her fingers brushed over the bandage, noting that it felt more tender the longer time passed. A quick survey of the wrap revealed that it still remained clean, and she vowed to herself that she would change it and investigate the wound more thoroughly once she had finished Hayate's nightly routine.

She closed the door behind her and shrugged her jacket off her shoulders and draped it over the dining room chair nearest her. "Hayate, I'm home!" The gentle click of his claws against the floor drew a smile from her lips as the puppy bound down the hallway from her room and toward her. "Were you on my bed again while I was gone," Riza cooed as he cantered toward her, tail wagging. She reached her hand out to greet him, "You know you're not supposed to—" Her sentence was cut short when Hayate promptly put on the brakes and skidded to a halt just out of her reach. His nostrils flared as he sniffed the air that bridged her hand from his nose. Her brows knitted together when his lip uncharacteristically curled and he took a few cautious steps back.

"Hayate?"

The pup's ears eagerly perked up and her momentary bout of confusion ebbed as she offered her hand again. This time, however, his face darkened and he suddenly leapt forward, snapping his teeth a few centimeters from the tips of her fingers. She gasped and jerked her hand away as he skittered back, ears flat against his head and eyes wide. He seemed to instantly realize what he had done and his tail tucked between his legs as he lowered his belly to the ground. "Hayate," she lightly scolded as she slowly edged forward. "What's gotten into—" Before she could finish, the pup turned tail and raced down the hallway and into her bedroom.

Perplexed, and slightly disturbed, by his behavior, Riza rose to her feet to follow after him. When she took a step forward, however, a wave of nausea rushed through her and she stumbled into the wall. She lifted a hand and pressed it against the cool plaster as her eyes screwed shut. The sickness, the heat that followed a beat later, had come out of nowhere. She drew in a sharp breath to try and compose herself despite the sudden burst of panic it had manifested in her.

Her thoughts turned to the bite and she tried to think back to what the doctor had said about infection. The muddled result of her searching came up with discussion of a local infection and the possible need for antibiotics, but never once had there been anything to suggest that something could happen systemically could happen… at least, not that quickly. She slid her hand forward as her thoughts turned toward the sudden need to find the toilet bowl and she shuffled her feet toward the bathroom while trying to maintain the wall's support. When her hand found the doorjamb, she pulled herself forward and staggered up to the sink, grasping it with shaking hands as another roll of nausea rushed through her. She bent over it and retched, the action eliciting a fit of coughs when nothing came of it. When it had waned, she drew in a sharp breath and released a hand from the edge of the sink, lifting it to her sweat-laden forehead as a piercing pain tore through her. She squeezed her eyes shut as she felt the world shift and begin to spin beneath her feet.

This had all come on so suddenly that she felts as though she couldn't catch hold of the mind that grounded her. Every grasp at that part of herself that she attempted fell short, and she felt herself slipping further from it as panic began to set in. Her breaths quickened as the pain escalated and her eyes shot open to find that the floor was still circling beneath her. Just as she tightened her hold on the skin and shut them again, though, the phone rang, and they flew open.

She took the moment to steady herself and hold, debating through the myriad of breaths and stabbing pain whether she had imagined it or not. But when she heard it again, she pushed herself away from the sink and fell back against the doorway.

The phone sounded a third time and she stumbled down the hallway. Before she could reach it, her foot caught on the carpet and she fell forward onto her hands and knees. She pushed herself up in an attempt to rise to her feet, but was stopped short when the muscles in her back spasmed and pulled her down again. She jerked her head around to try and find what it was that she had tripped on, to see if Hayate had returned after his temporary bout of insanity. Needles of pain drove themselves into her feet and she kicked her legs out from under her, bracing herself against her elbows as the pain shot through her legs and radiated throughout her entire body. It pulsed and grew, waxing and waning as it slowly crawled, inch by inch, up her waist and to her chest until it trickled down her arms and into her fingertips.

What she thought had been a trick of the light proved to be so much more than that as she watched a series of fine, brown hairs pushed themselves through the pores of her skin. She fell onto her side and kicked her leg up to assess what it was that was happening to her but paused when she saw her hands.

Her nail beds had begun to darken and sink into her skin, and the same forest of brownish hairs that were on her feet had begun to flourish there too. She curled them into fists and pressed them against her chest, as though the action would somehow slow its progression, and tried to slowly tease herself through the increasingly tumultuous thicket of panicked thoughts that had taken hold of her mind. As she began to push toward the clarity the day's events would bring, the shrill screech of her phone once again broke through the fog that had settled in her mind, and her hands went to her ears to muffle the sound.

The lag between her association with the ring and the possible salvation it would bring lasted another few beats before she collected enough of her thoughts to form that realization. She half-stumbled, half-crawled the few remaining steps over to the phone and reached up, knocking the receiver off its cradle and onto the floor. The loud _bang_ it produced rattled her senses and she lifted her hands to her ears to muffle the painful reverberations.

" _Lieutenant?_ "

Her eyes snapped open and she looked down at the receiver.

"Col—" her voice caught in her throat and his rank died on her tongue.

" _Lieutenant? Lieutenant, what's wrong?_ "

Riza gasped and phone slipped from her grip and clattered to the floor. She buckled forward and wrapped her arms around herself as an intense pain drove herself into her stomach.

" _Lieutenant?! Lieutenant, answer me!_ " She cracked her eyes open to look down at the receiver she had curled herself around and fought every urge she had to scream into it for him, knowing that it would cause him an immense amount of distress. But her rationality was slipping and the fear of what was happening to her body began to push its way into her mind.

She sucked in a shallow breath and gasped, "Colone—" The word scraped through her throat before the 'n' caught and dragged through her lips, producing a deep, unfamiliar growl. Riza released a hand from her stomach and wrapped it around her neck as she felt her vocal cords begin to warp and stretch. It would be moments, she knew, before she would no longer have a voice with which to speak. She tested her voice again, and the same inhuman noise reverberated through her throat.

Sensing the criticalness of the situation, she heard Roy say, " _Riza, I'm coming. I'll be there in just a minute. Just… just hold on_!"

A minute, however, was far too long, she surmised.

When the dial tone finally reached her ears, the sob that had been building in her throat finally escaped. There was no telling what he would find one he arrived, and she regretted answering the phone to subject him to such a horrendous scene. She knew without looking, between the crawling skin and bursts of pain that ravaged her body, that whatever was happening had progressed to a tipping point, and was now free-falling toward its eventual end.

Somehow the creature that had bitten her had transferred the alchemical energy that had changed it and had bestowed it onto her. And now it was tearing her body apart, bit by bit, and glueing it back together into a shape that was unrecognizable. She made one final attempt to rise, to do something, but collapsed again, catching herself on appendages that looked more like paws than hands. It horrified her more realizing that her mind had perceived and willingly accepted that fact than listen to the last remaining sensible fragment that had suddenly been pushed to the back of her consciousness. And though she stretched and reached for it, her grasp fell short, and in turn her psyche continued its downward spiral.

Her pulse sped up and her breaths quickened as another wave of agony rolled over her and brought her back to her knees. Her eyes squeezed shut again to shield that last remaining fragment of herself from what was happening in a fruitless attempt to preserve what she knew would inevitably fade.

With the sense she had always relied on most now hindered, she realized through the increasingly voluminous oscillations of pain that her other senses had become amplified in the change. Every sound she unwillingly caught through her panicked breaths were reverberations of the stretch and pull of her muscles, tendons, and ligaments as they began to stretch and distort. She could hear her bones begin to shift to accompany the pain that was crawling up her spine and neck. She pressed her forehead to the ground and lifted stiff arms to dig her nails into her skull as the agony invaded her skull, feeling as though it had split it open.

No longer able to hold it back, she bit through her tongue and screamed.

* * *

Armed with an ignition glove and the spare key to Riza's apartment, Roy carefully inserted the key into the door that led into her townhouse, and took a moment to collect himself. There was no telling what he would find behind that door. But he knew too that pausing would only retract time from getting to her. With that in mind, he turned the key and pushed the door open, telling himself that anything he saw as a threat would be reduced to a pile of ash.

He lifted his gloved hand as the door creaked open and held his breath. Every inch of her apartment the light bathed immediately processed through his mind, and he hurriedly took inventory of everything he had become familiar with in her apartment over time. But nothing immediately jumped out at him as out of place and he carefully stepped inside and closed the door behind him. Another sweep of the apartment yielded no immediate intruder, nor anything out of place.

He swept past her dining table, making note that both her keys and purse were there, and poised his fingers as he rounded the first corner that led toward her bedroom. A deep rumble caught his attention and he whirled around, fingers pressed and ready. Before he could conjure the thought that would ignite the air that surrounded him, a massive force drove itself into him and knocked him onto his back. He instinctively lifted his arm as the monster that had slammed into him sank its teeth into the sleeve of his coat. He twisted and tore his sleeve from its grip and it redirected its jaws to close around his arm again. Roy turned his body again and swung his free arm out from beneath him. It yelped when his elbow connected with the side of its jaw, offsetting its balance overtop him. It staggered back and he pushed himself away and frantically scrambled to his feet. By the time it had recovered, he had his hand poised and lifted toward the chimera.

Its yellow eyes immediately fixed on the glove and widened, and it carefully eased itself away from him.

Its retreat granted him momentary respite, allowing him a moment to think about what he was going to do next. There was no doubt in his mind that it was of similar design as the one they had encountered earlier that day, albeit smaller and lankier than the first. Lighter too, he noted, taking into consideration that rather than the black and grey the other sported, it instead shades of brown, blonde, and white mixed into its coat. He pressed his fingers together as he watched it lowered its head and a pang of anger gripped him.

"Do you recognize this," he sneered as he brushed his thumb and forefinger against each other. The rub of the cloth between his fingers sent a spray of sparks through the air and it backed away with a low snarl. He thrust his arm forward and it retreated faster, baring its teeth as it backed itself into a corner. That was confirmation enough. "You're smart," he mumbled. "You must have been there earlier, wallowing in the shadows like the coward you are." Keeping his arm extended as far toward it as he could, he allowed his gaze to slowly drift away from the monster and toward Riza's bedroom door.

He thought he had heard a noise coming from the other side of that door. "Lieutenant, are you alright," he called as his eyes trailed back to the chimera. A few heartbeats passed and, when he did not hear a reply, he slowly backed toward the door. When he reached it, he passed his other hand behind his back and fumbled around until he found the doorknob and turned it. The resounding _click_ alerted the chimera and it slowly began its advance again. A simple flinch of his gloved hand was enough to encourage it to withdraw.

"You're lucky," he said as he slowly pushed the door open behind him. "You'd be a pile of ash if we didn't need a living specimen." He stepped back into the room and waited, but when it did not move again, he quickly closed the door behind him and turned around to face the room. "Riza," he whispered as he flipped the light switch on. "Riza, are you—"

Something touched his leg and he jumped, seconds later realizing that it was Black Hayate. His hands went down to encompass the frightened pup and pull him close. He whispered her name again and waited. But when he once again received no reply, his heart sank.

She wasn't there. She had either somehow slipped out before it could get to her, or it had… He swallowed thickly, refusing to even consider the latter option. There was simply no way. Not without Hayate.

He had to think rationally, however, and he willed himself to do so. Thinking back to those few moments when he was standing in the middle of her living area, he hadn't seen any signs of blood on the carpet or on the imitation chimera. If it really had gotten to her before he had arrived, he would have seen some signs of a struggle. If not in her apartment, then at least on the monster itself.

That is… if he could clearly remember whether there had or hadn't been. He began to doubt himself and wracked his brain, trying to remember. But without seeing it again, he could not say for certain what his mind had made him believe. He sucked in a breath and shifted Hayate in his arms, aggravating the frightened pup. Without looking toward him, Roy stroked his hand along the puppy's back and whispered words of endearment as he slowly turned and rested his hand on the door handle. Another breath drawn and a reminder that his Lieutenant was unaccounted for gave him the courage to set Hayate on the floor and push the door open to confront it again.

It still remained in the corner he had chased it into, curled into itself. When it saw the faintest shift of light and the creak of the door as Roy pushed it open, it rose to its four feet and drew its lips back.

Its appearance, now more clear in the trickle of light the bedroom produced, wasn't what had caused his heart to stop, however. Rather, it was the familiar band of white on its forearm that did. He felt the blood that pumped through his veins run cold and he stood, frozen, as the pieces of information he had slowly accumulated began to fall into place.

He may have been an alchemist many would consider advanced, but even he would never be able to figure out something so… twisted. His heart sank deep into his stomach, and his alchemic mind tried to play through every other possible scenario that could have resulted in what he was seeing. But everything - the band on its arm, the locked apartment with no signs of forced entry, Hayate's presence, and her absence were slowly beginning to build on each other, and he realized that the reason why he was so deeply unsettled by the 'chimera' they had seen earlier was because he had seen something _human_ about it. Had he voiced that thought when he had seen it rather than hold onto it, he could have prevented this.

It took every ounce of his strength to not buckle beneath the devastating reality he found himself faced with. To lift his hand even a few inches from his side felt impossible, as though the world's gravity had been dialed up. But he could not - would not- bow to its whim before he knew for certain that what his mind was screaming was true.

He inched forward and closed the door behind him, once again isolating himself with her. The 'chimera's' eyes immediately flitted over to the hand that still bore his ignition glove. He lifted it slightly and she flinched. He turned his gloved hand, palm facing toward himself. Her eyes snapped over to it and her lip curled toward the infernal symbol it bore. Roy stepped forward and she took two back. A grumble of warning reached his ears but he persevered, taking another careful step forward.

"You didn't shy away from this because you had seen it in action today, did you?" He asked as he slowly began to pull at his pointer finger. "You recognize this because you already know its power and the destruction that it's capable of." Roy hurriedly moved onto his middle and ring fingers, tugging at the fabric until it loosened from his fingertips and he was able to pull it off his hand. He held it out in its palm and the chimera snarled. Slowly, carefully, he slid his foot forward and eased toward her.

With nowhere left to go, the chimera lunged and snapped. He managed to pull his arm away before teeth met flesh and watched as she quickly drove herself back into the corner, ears pinned and teeth bared. Aggression was no longer the offensive. Instead, he realized that every action from the moment he wielded his ignition glove was purely rooted in fear.

Roy gave pause and waited a few moments before he crouched down and eased his arm out again. This time he opened his hand and turned it, and the glove slid out of his hand and onto the ground. When her eyes followed the glove down, he murmured, "You recognized this because it has burned you before, right?"

She jerked her head up and stared, golden eyes focused intently on his every move. He continued forth slowly, carefully, with one goal in mind: to look for that spark he had seen before. That flicker of humanity he had dismissed from the creature they had encountered earlier that day that he should have acknowledged.

He swallowed the lump that had begun to form in his throat and again eased himself forward, pushing back against the plethora of questions and scenarios that began to bombard his mind. At that moment, he did not know what he would do, or what could be done to fix what had happened. He would be lying to himself it he said he had an iota of a theory of what had transpired. The one thing he _did_ know, though, was that she needed him.

"I know you're scared," he whispered. "I am too." Even as he was slowly beginning to process what had happened, he knew that there was still the terrifying uncertainty of what the immediate future held. Where under normal circumstances, he would work through a rational, stepwise process that would deliver the afflicted to those with the necessary resources available to help. But when it came to her, anything really, his thoughts would scramble and any uncertainty that was buried before would surface. Would they take her from him? Experiment and further distort her? Or would they be left with no hope and muttered apologies and suggestions of life-ending salvation offered to animals?

 _No_ , he warned himself as he worked to steady his nerve and the hand extended that had begun to shake. As long as she was still there, no one would lay a hand on her. "I won't let anything happen to you. I'm here… Riza."

There was a lag from the moment her name left his lips to when it reached her ears. And then, when there was no longer that flicker, no indication of it, Roy felt his greatest fear come to fruition: that the feeble grasp at that spark of humanity he had seen had slipped through his fingertips. _Please…_ It couldn't- she couldn't- end like this. "Please… please answer." This time his voice was far weaker. No longer able to grab hold of the minuscule amount of strength he had mustered, he felt himself slowly begin to descend into the despondent darkness he had tried to will away. He needed validation, a sign that told him that more of her remained than just primitive fear.

He curled his fingers into a fist and slowly withdrew his hand, pressing it against his chest as the raw, unadulterated wave of complex emotion he had held at bay crashed over him. Roy bowed his head and wrapped trembling fingers around his fist. The caution he had held to so preciously minutes before was forgotten, and he felt a sob build in his throat. He swallowed it back and clenched his hands tighter against his chest as broken apologies began to pour unhindered from his lips. He again probed those wild eyes for something that could reignite, something to tell him that she was still there, and his heart stilled. The gold he had seen in them before had darkened to a more familiar brown.

Before he could reach for and nurture that spark, though, she let loose a demented howl and drove her head into the floor. Stiff arms immediately reached up to her face and she dug sharpened claws into her muzzle, ripping and tearing and shredding through the unnatural flesh as the realization of her humanity bled through and into an unfamiliar body, catalyzing a dangerous mixture of awareness and madness.

She fell to her side and continued her self-mutilation, but Roy refused to let another moment of it pass by. "Stop… _Stop it_!" His hand was immediately on her side and the pressure snapped her from her temporary delusion. Her eyes darted up to his, and he saw the struggle to grasp the sanity she had rediscovered as flecks of gold swirled feverishly through the chocolate brown she had possessed before. "Stop," he uttered in a low tone, balling fistfuls of fur into his hands. "I'm here…"

Her head fell against the floor as a soft whimper resonated in her throat. His other hand lifted without thought and her eyes snapped up to watch as he paused, hovering it just above her head. After a few moments, her inner battle calmed itself to a dull roar, and her eyes slowly closed. His hand stopped just short of the shredded bits of skin and brown and tan fur that had been on her nose and the full extent of what happened began to slowly sink in with his proximity to her. He passed over the sharp mouth and nose she had never owned. Across the almond-shaped eyes that had once been fuller. Past the changes that had made her face completely unrecognizable to him. Though he began to understand, there was still a shred of disbelief that part of him stubbornly clung to because he didn't _want_ to believe that he had been negligent enough to dismiss the concerns that had tugged at him since the moment he faced that chimera.

A quaking hand passed over her face and buried itself into the fur on her neck. No… he had been. And this was her.

This was her and he had failed her.

He had failed her… and _this_ was the result.

His head bowed forward and he fell into her, clinging desperately to what remained of her as the apology that had built in his throat poured continuously through his lips.

* * *

Though dull, the pain had been vexing enough to slowly draw Roy from the sleep that had finally set in. For minutes since then he had been battling with himself, debating whether or not he wanted to come to grips about with it. His hand wrapped around the puncture wound that the dying surge of adrenaline had unmasked, fingers curling gingerly around the swollen black and blue flesh of his arm. A sharp hiss broke through his lips as the wound began to throb, sending shocks of pain through his arm and torso.

He quickly turned his hand and flexed his fingers, half-expecting them to have changed into claws. But when he saw that they still remained as human, he slowly leaned his head back against the wall and pushed the fingers of his other hand through the mess of blonde hair that spilled over his lap. Riza responded to his touch by rolling in her sleep, gripping the jacket he had draped over her bare body to keep her warm. His hand remained still and his breath was held, and he followed her turn until she settled herself again. A content sigh followed her change in position and he watched as she buried her face deeper into the folds of his jacket. Seeing her face again, seeing the familiar pale hue of her skin and, admittedly, the blood-red ink of the tattoo on her back granted him a moment of respite from the thoughts that had been churning in his mind. He thought it had been permanent, and discovering that it wasn't injected a thin ray of light onto an otherwise dismal situation.

But the novelty of the study, however, was short-lived, as thousands upon thousands of thoughts had begun to pour into his mind, each more devastating that the next. The thoughts of experimentation, blood, and agony that could befall her, and possibly himself, trickled into his mind. Would they take her from him? Quarantine her to protect herself and others? Draw her blood until her vessels ran dry or poke and prod her until she bled out? Would they dissect her the way they did the infectious chimera, ripping away at bit by bit with scalpels and saws for an answer that may or may not be found? But the most devastating question, he thought as his hold on her tightened: despite the return of her normal appearance, would they even see her as human anymore…?

He had told himself before that he had a plan, that they would run until he figured out how to reverse whatever it was that was happening. It was something that had been assumed of his character so often that he had begun to expect it from himself every time. But the thoughts continued to circulate over and over again and, despite telling himself to think with a rational mind, he realized that there were holes in his theories and missing pieces of his so-called plan. Every dreadful thought that he had concocted before began to return, and the plan he had frantically devised began to erode away at it until it eventually crumbled and fell, leaving him with the devastating realization that he had no direction or thought of what would come next.


End file.
